The invention starts with a non-articulated wiper blade.
A non-articulated wiper blade is known from DE 101 13 680 A1 whose wiper strip is comprised of an elastomer material and has a spoiler situated on its upper side. This spoiler can be formed on directly and be comprised of the same material as the wiper strip or be a separate component made of another suitable plastic. The spoiler can serve as a supporting element of the wiper blade by itself or together with spring rails, which are inserted into lateral longitudinal grooves of the profile of the wiper strip. Mounted on the ends of the wiper blade are caps, whose guide surfaces run in the longitudinal direction of the wiper blade and are adjacent with a slight shoulder to the guide surface of the spoiler. Because of the guide surfaces of the spoiler and the end caps, the air steam increasingly presses the wiper blade against the vehicle window with increasing vehicle speed if the air stream is flowing towards the wiper blade essentially transverse to the longitudinal direction.
In the center region of the wiper blade in a section of the spoiler, a connecting device according to the so-called sidelock system is fastened to the supporting element, in which the wiper arm runs laterally parallel to the wiper blade in the region of the connecting device. It is also known as a so-called overlock system, in which the wiper arm runs above the wiper blade in the region of the connecting device. The connecting device has two claws on each of its side parts, which laterally clasp and hold the spring rails of the supporting element.
A non-articulated wiper blade is known from DE 198 35 065 A1, which has a wiper strip with a wiper lip and a top strip. The top strip is connected to the wiper lip in a usual manner via a rocker bridge, which is delimited by two lateral longitudinal grooves. The top strip has a central longitudinal channel, in which a supporting element is embedded in the form a flat, rectangular spring rail. A connecting element in the form of a sheet metal claw is fastened in the central region of the top strip as related to the longitudinal extension. It has a U-shaped profile with a base adjacent to the top strip and adjacent side walls extending towards the outside in the longitudinal direction of the wiper blade so that the U-shaped profile is open towards the side facing away from the wiper strip. The two side walls are connected to each other in their center region by a joint bolt, which serves to couple the wiper blade to a wiper arm according to the top-lock system. In the vicinity of the front sides of the sheet metal claws, two sheet metal tabs are notched out of each the side walls and these tabs are bent around the top strip and partially clasp the spring rails on the longitudinal sides. The claw feet formed by the tabs are pressed together so far perpendicularly against the wide sides of the spring rail until the sheet metal claw sits secure from displacement on the spring rail. In this case, it is advantageous if the intermediate layer between the sheet metal claw and the spring rail, which is formed in the exemplary embodiments by the top strip of the wiper strip, has a greater coefficient of friction than the sheet metal claw and the spring rail.
This applies in general to materials from which wiper strips are fabricated. The depicted embodiments show spring rails as supporting elements that are fabricated as one piece of a metal, however, they can also be comprised in principle of several individual parts. During the assembly of the sheet metal claws, difficulties are to be expected, however, in the positioning of the spring rails if two spring rails that run essentially parallel are provided.
In addition, a wiper blade with a supporting bracket system is known from DE 43 20 637 A1. A spring rail is provided in a central longitudinal channel. This rail has partial widenings in its end regions, which expand the longitudinal channel towards the outside in a wart-like manner so that the spring rail is secured in the longitudinal direction, particularly when a holding claw of a bow is situated between two wart-like elevations.